Strategic Planning: A Beginner’s 5-Step Guide

Does your organization have a strategic plan? Do you have a clear path of action to accomplish your mission and fulfill your vision? Strategic planning is a very important step in building a successful organization, no matter its size. Without one, you may have trouble reaching your goals, and it will be tough to demonstrate the organizational capacity of founders who want to invest their funding in capable organizations. So, what is a strategic plan, and how do you make one?

What Is A Strategic Plan?

“Strategic planning is an organizational management activity that is used to set priorities, focus energy and resources, strengthen operations, ensure that employees and other stakeholders are working toward common goals, establish agreement around intended outcomes/results, and assess and adjust the organization’s direction in response to a changing environment.” (https://balancedscorecard.org/strategic-planning-basics/). In other words, strategic planning is the process of how an organization determines what practical action steps are necessary to take its clearly defined mission statement and make it actually happen.

What Should Be Included

The strategic plan is a tool that will help you further define your organization’s mission and vision by honing in on the company’s goals and objectives. Getting a clear picture of where your organization is going and what you want to accomplish will allow you to put measures in place that make the most impact. Per Martins (2024), typically, your strategic plan should include:

• Your company’s vision statement
• Your company’s mission statement
• Your organizational goals, including your long-term goals and short-term, yearly objectives
• Any plan of action, tactics, or approaches you plan to take to meet those goals

5 Steps To Developing A Solid Strategic Plan

Sound daunting? Don’t worry, it’s not as hard as you might think, especially if you already have a clear mission and vision statement.

Step 1: Identify Your Current Position

Using your mission statement as a framework for what success looks like for your organization, determine how close you are to achieving the goal of your mission. Ask the following questions:

1. What resources are already in place?
2. What resources are still needed?
3. What steps have already been taken?
4. What still needs to be done?

Step 2: Outline Your Strategy

Identify what work has yet to be done and organize those tasks in stages, prioritizing the steps that will have the greatest impact. Ask the following questions:

1. Which types of impact are the highest priority for us right now?
2. Which of these initiatives are most in line with our mission/vision?
3. What resources/steps/individuals are needed to accomplish these tasks/goals?
4. How will we measure our success?

Step 3: Put It Into Action

Now that you’ve identified, prioritized, and established the necessary steps and resources needed, it’s time to assign those tasks to your team with clear objectives, instructions, and timelines.

Step 4: Measure Your Progress/Success

It’s important to keep a record of outcomes as you implement your plan. Not only will this data be crucial information for your organization going forward in determining what works and what doesn’t, but it is also usually a requirement from grantmakers.

Step 5: Revise & Adjust

Be intentional about reviewing your strategic plan in light of your measured outcomes. Is it working? Is it helping you achieve your goals? Is it still in line with your mission and vision? It’s not uncommon for a strategic plan to need tweaking and adjusting every now and then. Learning what doesn’t work is just as important as learning what does work. All the effort of creating a strategic plan and measuring outcomes is wasted if we don’t use them effectively, just as a compass is only useful if you’re willing to adjust your course!

Happy strategic planning, friends!

References 

Martins, Julia. (2024). What is strategic planning? A 5-step guide. Retrieved from https://asana.com/resources/strategic-planning

Strategic Planning Basics. (2024). Retrieved from https://balancedscorecard.org/strategic-planning-basics/

More Resources:

https://onstrategyhq.com/resources/strategic-planning-process-basics/
https://www.lucidchart.com/blog/5-steps-of-the-strategic-planning-process#:~:text=Strategic%20planning%20process%20steps,-Determine%20your%20strategic&text=Prioritize%20your%20objectives.,Review%20and%20revise%20the%20plan.